Into Great Silence

If you want to see the contemplative, Roman Catholic view of Christ's teachings, this is for your. If you want to see a truly natural and realistic movie without artificial lighting (except the electric lights already at the monastery) this is for you. This movie is an absolute must for people who want to see what can been done just by taking a camera into the field and shooting. The message is simple and repeated over and over again because the contemplative life is simple and they spend their days trying to "grasp that which cannot be grasped": "Grace" and God. This movie is a must for those who think that Catholicism is too mystical. It clearly describes the simple beliefs of the contemplative life: that as one abandons one's attachments to things and the material world, one is seduced into the nirvana of religious enlightenment. During the final scene with the blind monk, an interesting comment is made on body sculpting, plastic surgery and other techniques that make one appear younger than one is. Incidentally, a Hindu or Buddhist would find the Christian view of nirvana described in this movie very interesting and the contemplative Christian path astonishingly similar to the contemplative Hindu and Buddhist paths.

A sensitive and deeply moving film. We follow the life in silence of the monks in the Grande Chartreuse Monastery in the French Alps. Only once a week are the monks aloud to talk when they go for a walk in the woods or glide in the snow during winter. The photography is magnificent as the camera respectfully observes the monks quiet life of prayer and daily tasks. At certain intervals we see close-up of the monks whose faces impact us by simply being present. During two hours we become part of the monastery, the routines and the beauty of the mountains that surround us. After seeing fifty films at the Sundance Film Festival, this is the film that has stayed with me. The filmmaker waited 16 years before he got permission to shoot in the monastery and it was well worth waiting.

I've often pondered which sense would I rather lose: sight or hearing. I had decided sight would be the one to live without since music has the power to make me weep (often). But "Die Große Stille" has made me rethink all of that. It's a pointless game anyway, but I reexamined the importance of sound in my life versus the magnificent, ravishing images put forth in this film.

Like the works of Frederick Wiseman, it's less a work of cinema than a window that Gröning offers. We watch seemingly arbitrary action both mundane and ecstatic. We're not "told" who these people are as individuals nor why they have chosen to wall themselves off from the world's joy and suffering. But as we watch, the pace of the film is slowed so that we enter this world and test our own thoughts about human contact as well as faith. But only if you're so inclined. There's no proselytizing.

At one point late in the film one monk chides the world for living without God, and you immediately think, "How would YOU know?" And immediately we see the value of silence. In silence we don't argue or plead, complain or preach. We simply live with our thoughts, and here the brothers seem very comfortable with whatever it is they are thinking.

Through repetition and ceremony, we enter the serenity these men have found. And while there's beauty in the physical aspects of both the natural world in its changing seasons as well as the cloistered setting, it's the tranquil beauty of faces that rivet. We meet them as individuals only in a series of live portraits where their eyes stare into the lens, through the camera, and into our souls. If I didn't have my sight, I would have missed that and been lesser for it.

For me, this was an amazing experience. But for others in the theater it was tough evidenced by squirming and the occasional snore. Surprisingly, it was the younger members of the audience who seemed most entranced.

Very beautiful and original pictures in this movie. You can also enjoy such simple things as the sound of the snow falling or a scissors cutting a wool cloth...

In my opinion, the movie is not repetitious. I think the intention of the director is to introduce you in the monks' everyday life, and therefore you have to understand the routine and discipline they are attached to. It is just the silence that illuminates these people.

And I didn't know there were such really sweet monks in the catholic church!

At the cinema everybody were staying till the very end, although I have to say that someone was sleeping behind me ;-)

Winter, spring, summer, fall...and winter. No, this is not the quasi-eponymous Korean movie. It is the period of time over which the film was shot, around 2002. It is a documentary on the Grande Chartreuse cloister situated in a deep valley above the city of Grenoble, France. A couple of dozen monks live there. There are novices on probation and seniors long having made their vow of permanent ascetic life. The rhythm of their daily cloistered routines is the backbone of the film: frequent prayers, meals eaten alone in individual private apartments, execution of assigned chores, etc. From Monday to Saturday few words are exchanged. The only sounds are those of human movement, work activities, church bells and chirps from the surrounding forest. The only music to be heard is that of liturgical evening chants.

Not every aspect of monastic life is covered. As the director explains, this is not an informational film. It is a long contemplation on ascetic life. It may seem too long after two hours. The tedious repetitiveness is purposeful however. Even on-the-screen quotes are shown multiple times throughout the movie accentuating that repetitiveness. It is enough to convince us that it takes a special individual to commit to such constrained existence, one modulated only by the moods of the seasons. We are presented with snapshots of odd moments: monks frolicking in the snow; preparing a vegetable garden for spring seeding; a summer Sunday outing when monks are free to socialize and, on this day, they discuss the appropriateness of washing one's hands before meals (a contrarian monk has a simple solution: don't get your hands dirty).

Despite the isolation, there are signs the outside world is not too far. Fruits are served with supermarket produce number stickers still attached, correspondence and bills arrive and managed with a laptop computer (no evidence of an Internet connection), and some of the tools are distinctly modern.

It's a quiet film. Too long and soporific for some, possibly inspiring to others. What stayed with me after watching 162 minutes of this is the plain beauty of the cloister and the reminder of a life style that we may have thought extinct in the West.